Overview

Embraced by the Baby Boomer generation and spawning countless imitators, the sophomore film of writer-director Lawrence Kasdan was a successful comedy-drama with a best selling soundtrack of Motown hits. Kevin Kline and Glenn Close star as Harold and Sarah Cooper, a couple whose marital troubles are put on hold while they host an unhappy reunion of former college pals gathered for the funeral of one of their own, a suicide victim named Alex. As the weekend unfolds, the friends catch up with each other, play the ...

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Overview

Embraced by the Baby Boomer generation and spawning countless imitators, the sophomore film of writer-director Lawrence Kasdan was a successful comedy-drama with a best selling soundtrack of Motown hits. Kevin Kline and Glenn Close star as Harold and Sarah Cooper, a couple whose marital troubles are put on hold while they host an unhappy reunion of former college pals gathered for the funeral of one of their own, a suicide victim named Alex. As the weekend unfolds, the friends catch up with each other, play the music of their youth, reminisce, smoke marijuana, and pair off with each other in unexpected combinations. Included are Michael Jeff Goldblum, a smarmy journalist; Sam Tom Berenger, a TV star; Karen JoBeth Williams, unhappily married and pining for Sam; Nick William Hurt, a drug-addicted Vietnam vet; and Meg Mary Kay Place, a single career woman who wants a child. Joining the group is Alex's bizarre girlfriend Chloe Meg Tilly, who finds new love with Nick. As they learn to deal with the truth about the loss of idealism in their lives and Alex's sad demise, the friends find their bond still intact, while the marriage of Harold and Sarah is healed in an unusual way that's in sync with the era of their youth. Cut from the release of The Big Chill 1983 was the brief appearance of young actor Kevin Costner as Alex. Kasdan promised Costner a role in his next picture, which turned out to be a star-making part in Silverado 1985.

Special Features

New interview with Kasdan; Reunion of cast and crew from the 2013 Torontro International Film Festival, including Kasdan and actors Tom Berenger, Glenn Close, Kevin Kline, Mary Kay Place, Meg Tilly, and JoBeth Williams; Documentary from 1998 to the making of the film; Deleted scenes; Trailer; Plus: A booklet featuring an essay by writer and filmmaker Lena Dunham and a 1983 piece by critic Harlan Jacobson

Editorial Reviews

All Movie Guide

A seminal baby boomer angst session, The Big Chill proved enormously popular with audiences who saw their own thirty-something anxieties brought to life with the aid of an impossibly catchy soundtrack. The film eulogized the lost ideals and enthusiasms of the 1960s and pondered what, if anything, had taken their place. The film begins with the funeral of Alex, long considered the best and brightest of the group of friends, whose death and burial symbolize the collective death of a relentlessly mythologized, sentimentalized era. The survivors are left to scratch their heads, smoke some pot, and dance around the kitchen in an effort to figure out what happened, and why. It is a testament to Lawrence Kasdan's strengths as a writer and director that, while the film does dip its toe repeatedly in the collective pool of nostalgia, it tends more towards melancholy reflection than sentimental excess. The friends question what happened to the promise of their youth, but they do so with an eye towards explaining their present state, rather than trying to recreate their past glories. It is little surprise that this sort of reflective meditation hit such a chord with its audience, many of whom were easing into the same sort of complacent, suburban lifestyle that they may have once claimed to abhor. Composed of equal parts mourning and acceptance, The Big Chill became an anthem for a generation trying to accept the fact that their present was not the future they had hoped it would be.

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